


The Deep Breath Before the Plunge

by sapphire_child



Category: Lost
Genre: Episode: s03e21 Greatest Hits, F/M, Gen, POV First Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-05-05
Updated: 2008-05-05
Packaged: 2019-01-19 09:54:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 640
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12408108
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sapphire_child/pseuds/sapphire_child
Summary: Charlie’s thoughts in the outrigger before he jumps into the ocean in Greatest Hits.





	The Deep Breath Before the Plunge

**Author's Note:**

> Pointless angsting internal monologue. GO ME.

I never thought my life would end like this.

Not that I ever really thought my life would be ending at the tender age of twenty-five at all – but then life never really goes to plan does it? All the most carefully set out schemes can all too easily be laid to ruin. Case in point: my career as a musician. I had my fifteen minutes of fame and then got dumped back into the gutter again, my spirit broken and my body drug addled to boot.

I certainly wasn’t planning on being in a plane crash either – funny that it would be the best thing that’s ever happened to me. It got me clean, straightened me out, made me learn a thing or two about myself and dropped a gorgeous girl and her equally gorgeous son pretty much right into my lap.

When Liam gave me the ring, he told me that one day I was going to have a family, a wife and baby. His own life was well and truly in the toilet at that point in time – he didn’t even think that he was going to make it past thirty and to be honest, neither did I. And yet somehow, within a year, we’d completely flipped the coin over – I was so messed up that I couldn’t go a day without fixing and he was clean as a whistle and had a brand new shiny life with a family who absolutely loved him to pieces.

And I’ll admit it – when I went to Australia I was jealous to see his suburban castle, to see what he’d become. It was everything I had once craved, and everything that was now unreachable for me. I think that’s the reason why when I first met Claire I wanted so badly to take care of her and Aaron. I wanted to have a real family again – somebody who could love me unconditionally, that I could protect and love and cherish and just bloody well _enjoy_.

It seems ironic – in the bitterest sense of the word – that I should finally have a family, fall head over heels for them and then have to give it all up again so that I can save them.

That’s why I can’t turn back now, even though it’s all I want to do. It makes my heart ache to know that I’ll never get to see my Aaron grow up – and he really does feel like he’s _my_ Aaron now even though I know that he’s not. It’s funny, but with everything between Claire and I, the one thing that has either brought us together or kept us apart is Aaron.

Sometime I wonder if we would have even been friends if she hadn’t been pregnant.

Sometimes I wonder if I actually love Aaron more than I’ve ever loved Claire.

Sometimes…well, all the time lately I’ve been wondering if at the end, I’ll have the courage and the fortitude to just leave this life behind knowing full well that I’ll never see either of them again. That I’ll never hold Aaron in my arms or kiss Claire’s hair while she sleeps…

Well...now I’ve left them – every step an agonising moment of self doubt. All roads have led here and now there are no more forks to take, no more detours to keep me from my inevitable…fate.

This time it’ll be the end of the road for me.

Wrapping the weight belt around my hand I take a deep breathe and unbidden, I see Claire’s pale eyes, Aaron’s innocent smile in my minds eye and it’s all I can do to stop myself from crying. I take a steadying breath, glance once more at Desmond’s prone form and then I take my final breath, hold it deep within me...

And then I jump.


End file.
